The final Celtic v Rangers game of 2003-04 was petering out into a dull 0-0 Parkhead draw - and what should we have cared?

The title had long been wrapped up; Celtic already had four victories that season against Rangers (including a Scottish Cup tie) and we were relishing the prospect of a day out at Hampden in the Scottish Cup final against Dunfermline. But we still cared alright.

Neither of Glasgow’s big two had ever previously recorded so many victories against the other in a single season and now it seemed that Celtic were about to blow the chance of doing so with a rather tepid display against a Rangers side who were clearly intent on reaching the end of the game without another defeat.

But what happened in those last couple of minutes remains etched upon the collective Celtic memory. 

We’ve seen the footage often and we also have Chris Sutton’s own recorded reflections on it from a few years back when he decided to share them on social media. 

The long ball out of defence. Sutton’s headed flick onto Henrik Larsson. The gentlest of touches back to Sutton. But the big evil genius still has a lot to do even to contemplate the prospect of a goal.

READ MORE: It's about time Celtic called Rangers' bluff - Tony Haggerty

He’s wrestling with Frank de Boer on the edge of the penalty area before finally managing to shake off the attentions of the Dutch World Cup defender. But it’s still an improbable task. 

Yet Sutton executes the most nonchalantly exquisite and disguised chip to float the ball over Stefan Klos. We all knew from the moment it left his foot that it was a goal.

And there’s Sutton running away to the Celtic End and doing his get it right roon’ ye clenched fist salute and we’re going absolutely bananas. 

On paper, it was perhaps one of the least crucial winners against Rangers (if any win against our old rivals can ever be described as such) but I greeted it with as much joy as Murdo MacLeod’s belter in the legendary 4-2 game or Christopher Jullien’s in the 2019 League Cup final or George McCluskey’swinner at Hampden in the 1980 Scottish Cup final. 

And besides, it wiped out the brutal memories of seven years before when Rangers won all four league games.

Yet here we are again with Celtic on the brink of another five-win haul against Rangers, the second against them in seven seasons. Brendan Rodgers’ side managed five out of six against Rangers in 2016-17. That season it should have been six out of six. 

But somehow, in a 1-1 draw at Parkhead, Bobby Madden deemed Clint Hill’s last-minute foul on Leigh Griffiths inside the box a legitimate antic. Hill had both arms around Griffiths and, from my seat behind that goal, it was as clear a foul as that time at Ibrox in 2006 when Neil Lennon was cleaned out in the box.  

Celtic Way:

This season it’s a bit different, isn’t it? Rangers are stronger now than they were back in 2017. And, unlike then, several of their players have a habit before these games of telling everyone that Rangers are better than Celtic and that they have “closed the gap” under their new manager, despite this being palpably untrue. 

This narrative has continued, even after Celtic comprehensively outplayed them just a few weeks ago in the League Cup final. It’s almost as though that game has been erased from the record books according to the press and some Rangers players.

Indeed, if it hadn’t been for another couple of inexplicable and bizarre decisions in the 2-2 game at Ibrox we’d potentially be looking at six out of six. 

Under Ange Postecoglou though, I’d say this current Celtic side is the best I’ve seen since the Lisbon Lions era. And we should be approaching the upcoming triple-header against Rangers in the firm belief that they can and should win all three encounters. 

Nor should it make much difference that the last of these three encounters at Ibrox will be played without any Celtic supporters.

No matter what you read in Scotland’s docile football press, Rangers created this situation simply because they couldn’t handle the sight and sound of 8,000 Celtic supporters celebrating wins at Ibrox.

And such have been the issues around the safety of the players, staff and supporters when there are only 750 allowed in, Celtic had no other option but to refuse such a small allocation. 

But in the last few seasons in games at Ibrox (discounting the Covid season) when this protocol has been in operation Celtic have thrived in this most hostile of environments.

They've won two, including the excellent 2-0 victory before lockdown, and in the 1-0 defeat at the beginning of Postecoglou’s tenure it was an excellent match that could have gone either way. 

Rangers, like the rest of the SPFL, simply do not have an answer to the way that Celtic play football or to their superior fitness levels. This doesn’t make them a bad team, just inferior to a splendid Celtic one.

However, in the VAR era, I now approach these games with an added degree of caution that has nothing to do with our merits or those of our opponents.

For the first time as a supporter I now have no confidence that the rules are being applied equally and fairly to Celtic.

Once, before the era of social media and analytics, the ‘nothing-to-see-here’ merchants could retreat behind the mantra that bad decisions, over the course of a season, evened themselves out.

Not this season, though. The writing, analysis and use of data about football in Scotland by amateur bloggers is now far superior than most of what you’ll find in the mainstream. And it’s in the deep-dive analysis on these blogs you’ll find that it would likely take another few years before VAR decisions that have gone against Celtic at crucial times are evened out.

Meanwhile their closest rivals have still yet to concede a penalty in domestic football this season.

It may be that Celtic will have to find reassurance in the observations of late club chairman Sir Robert Kelly in his eponymous history of Celtic in 1970.

That if we keep scoring goals at the rate we’ve been doing it’ll be difficult to knock them all off - or counter them with dodgy penalties.